Beading Daily Necklace Swap

Need I say more that I was busy beading the last couple of months! Well, not only I was beading, I also joined my first beadwork exchange. My partner is Melinda from Alaska, who's into bright colors. I found some striking beads in my stash so I concentrated on them... and here's what I came out with.

Necklace and Earrings Set for Melinda of Alaska

Techniques: tubular peyote and stringing

Materials: freshwater pearls, turquoise gemstones and seed beads

My sendee partner is Lois from Utah and she made me this fabulous piece! I love it and had to wear it once I got it. I seldom do wirework in the past, but I can see myself wireworking in the near future.

Necklace from Lois of Utah

Technique: basic wirework

Materials: Mother of Pearls, bicones, and freshwater pearls

And another BD friend made this commissioned works for me. I'm planning to use them on a special project so stay tune. Made of sterling silver and copper wires.

Have a great Tuesday all!

Christmas Pines...

... for 2010 EGA Heartland Fall Seminar! I stitched more models so they can be displayed at the upcoming 2010 EGA Heartland Spring Seminar. I thought it would be fun to use different fabrics, fibers and colors. Moreso, I'm making companion pieces as included in my proposal was how to finish other fiber-filled sewing accessories. Further details for the first stitched piece was posted here. Notice that I added a gold-tone daisy and pearl at the center of roof on the recent models.

So there you go, since the contract is with me already, I can now announce that I'll be teaching a half day class at the Fall Seminar on October. Mississipi River Valley Chapter will be sponsoring the said event... will talk about further details later on. I was extremely excited when I recieved the invitation, and I can't wait for it to come! I love the fact that I'll be able to spend time with fellow stitchers, and talk about our needlwork passion.

I started making "korona" (a Tagalog term which means crown) pincushion last year so I thought it would be great to make a new series of them.

Another good news I wanna share is that I was invited to be the Guest Speaker and teacher at a local EGA chapter on next year's anniversary! It's also a gathering I can't wait to partake. It's a dream come true for me to be able to teach my love of 3D hand finishing.

Also, to other EGA chapters (which I will mention the chapter names when the right time comes), thanks to all of you for including one of my works in your upcoming workshops. I'm in the process of finishing more on-site and off-site exclusive teaching pieces aside from the ones you already saw. Please extend your patience with me as I try to accomodate all your requests. Slowly but surely as the saying goes... I still want to do 100% of the work on my models... from designing to stitching (and sometimes a lil' frogging) to finishing. I'm so humble with your requests and can't wait to see your completed pieces.

And lastly, I finally managed to finish more models for TGOSM... and want to apologize sincerely to Kirsten for taking these models to reach her... and very thankful for the break. I know it's been quite a while but I can't wait to share new finishing ideas.

I look forward to a great and busy stitching week! I hope you do too!

Nature's Beauty Bracelet And Earrings Set

For instant gratification, I strung some beads on a long flexi-wire while watching the night news and ended up with this bracelet. Though when DH saw it, he's not sold with the idea of a chunky blue stone which for me is the focal point. Anyway, I might re-string it and replace the blue stone. About 8" and is made of fire-polished, gemstones, turquoise, green jade and iris seed beads.

Should you have suggestions, I would love to hear them. Thanks again for dropping by!

Cellini Necklace In Progress

I find my mathematical ability is put into good used whenever I'm doing a bead stitching project. Same goes whenever I finish a 3D stitched piece! For me, beadweaving is as calming as counted thread embroidery.

Here's what I pictured this piece in my mind, but during the execution, I didn't find it appealing. The proportion is too off! I had to dismantle it to say the least.

The 2 segments are a wee bit over 7" so I thought of using each segment as focal point of a necklace and bracelet to make a set. But that didn't worked out for me too so I had to consider other options again.

I'm considering this but again, I think the pendant is too small. I'm also on a look out of big stone pendant that will match the colors of the E beads.

And my last option is to make a flower pendant out of these 1" size stones. I'm tied up at the moment therefore the project will have to wait for a while... or maybe a long while!

Thanks for dropping by all! Don't forget to leave a feedback should you have any suggestion for this piece. I would really appreciate it!

More Jewelries For A Good Cause

I hope you guys are not tired yet with my jewelries. I know I've made so much of them already, but I wanna finish as much as I can so I can sell some of them and donate the proceeds to the needy kids back home. There's these 3 siblings in the neighborhood I grew up wherein their father has been diagnosed with severe diabetes. He used to work in the construction and his family was doing pretty good until his sickness. While I was there, I found out that his big toe was infected and had to be cut. It has been months since and it's not healing, and the infection is getting up to his leg. I was told by my parent and siblings recently that his leg might be cut too. It just break my heart hearing this... They don't have anybody to turn to as their relatives can barely support their daily needs as well.

For me, the worst part in the situation is that the children has to suffer too. The eldest among the 3 siblings is in junior HS and is currently living at her maternal grandparents (which can barely survive too). The second is in 5th grade and almost didn't able to enroll last year... there's a big possibilty she won't be able to this year unless somebody will help them out. The youngest who's 6 years old while I was there last year, haven't been to school.:( Despite the fact that the girl really wanna go. The enrollment won't be 'til June so I'm planning to set-up a jewelry store for my beadworks to help these siblings. I asked my sister to take a picture of the siblings next time the eldest is there so you can see them. I'm leaning towards having a silent auction for my pieces but nothing is finalize yet.

Anyway, here's a necklace with beaded beads and spiral peyote as focal point. Made of glass pearls, seed and E beads with toggle and clasp closure.

I enjoy putting this bracelet together and the dangling earrings with lever back are fun to make. Again, the bracelet has spiral peyote strip as focal point. Made of pink jade gemstone, magnetic hematite, silver findings, seed and E beads.

I think I'll gonna keep this bracelet as I don't have any pink in my personal collection. Made of pink jade, glass and seed beads. It's a little over 8" and fits like a cuff on my wrist.

These 2 bracelets has matching earrings and they're for my 7 and 2 yo nieces back home. I used spiral weave on the left and St. Petersburg stitch on the right. Made of seed beads with loop and pearl closures.

DH wasn't impress with this necklace but I love it. It can be worn as single or double strands... both ends of the inner link has lobster clasp therefore it's detacheable. Made of Mother-of-pearl, seed beads and freshwater pearls.

And lastly, here's another set of earrings I also made for my friend's daughter. Made of glass pearls and crystal spacers with lever back earrings.

Thanks for dropping by everybody!

Still Talking About Beading

As my bead stash increased tremendously, I knew I had to do some re-organization to make my life a lot easier, or should I say to save time when I need to look for a specific bead item. But first, I wanna show some of my recent purchases... freshwater pearls and crystals. These are just about 1/3 of what I got.

Bless DH heart for getting me containers. LOL I think I now have about 20 of these and I love them! They really come handy and serve their purpose very well. I just need to label them and am done. I use them for my focal beads, pearls, cabs and findings.

As for the seed beads (11's, 8's, 6's), I relied on sterilite clear boxes for storage. Whenever I open a new package, I simply transfer them on a 3"x4" ziplock and circular tin boxes (see last photo).

And of course, I need to prepare a to-go stash whenever the IA weather is unfriendly or whenever me and DH has to stay at the hotel where he works. It's pretty common during wintertime that we have no choice but to stay there ya know.:) Here are some of the mini boxes I used for those times. But of course, I also have a cross-stitch to-go!

Lastly, here's a glimpse of my work-in-progress bead stitching. I prefer to use a frame (with velvet or felt) as my tray and dump my beads there instead of working on top of the table. This way, I can put the frame on my lap, yet work easily.

I hope everybody's having a great day!

Happy Valentine's Day

I'm sorry for not blogging much recently. Been busy in my cocoon again. We're having another bad weather again therefore DH had to leave early for work... way early actually!

On the positive note, we had a small gathering today (minus DH) and played domino for hours at a friend's house in town. Me and the in-laws has been enjoying our ladies day/night out since January and play domino. We try to do it over the weekends though so everybody is off from work. Before we play, we usually eat first as almost everybody is bringing food. Domino is ADDICTING... period! LOL

I hope you all had a fabulous Heart's Day!